“Our old truck is no longer running, basically scrap metal, which means we have no way of getting to our shows!” read the smoke signals the Brothers Burn Mountain sent out Friday morning in the form of a Facebook status update. Before the acoustic duo of Wisconsinites even left their home-state to promote the project’s third album, Deep in Dark Woods, Jesse and Ryan Dermody were stuck. When the Northern Star talked to the brothers Friday afternoon, they assured us they would try their “damndest” to make CD release party tonight at the House Café, 263 E. Lincoln Highway.

Northern Star: Could you tell me a little bit about the origin story of Brothers Burn Mountain? I read that you formed the project while you were traveling through Europe. Could you guys tell me a little bit about that?

Ryan Dermody: Yeah, sure. We started playing music when we were really young, but we began taking it seriously about one and a half years ago with a sharp realization that it’s our calling. Traveling over in Europe has been a great influence to us because of hiking in the mountains with backpacks, and I’ve heard that drinking mountain stream water that you purify yourself, takes off the calcium covering on your third eye and so, walking through the mountains having to be rather damn self-reliant, we learned how to awaken our third eyes.

NS: Do you think that the backpacking experience has helped you guys with touring now through the United States?

RD: Yeah, we’re a little more wise and more disciplined in our art. We had to be a bit more street-wise and I think that that comes through in our songs.

Jesse Dermody: Yeah, well added on to what my brother said, you know, when you’re hiking through the mountains and say you have a 2 day supply of water and you have three days of hiking and there aren’t any known water supplies, you get concerned about water and that’s like a metaphor for now when we’re planning it out on the road, traveling around from shore to shore in this country. We’ve learned to conserve a lot of our inner energy like we used to have to conserve our water.

NS: There seems to be a lot to do with nature in you guys’ album. How does nature play a role in your music?

RD: Well nature is like our our temple and music is our religion. That might be one way of saying it. Music is our prayer and nature is our prayer place, if that makes sense.

NS: I read that you said one of your major inspirations was “the imperfections of nature.” Would you mind explaining a little bit about that?

JD: Yeah, well I remember once, I would have forgotten about it, but every so often someone reminds me that I once said that the wavering imperfections of nature are a true inspiration for us and it’s true. I mean, you listen to Bob Dylan and Neil Young and Leonard Cohen and Johnny Cash, none of these guys are like technically perfect or Jimi Hendrix, too. There’s something that’s, how would you say, more pertinent than perfection when it comes to getting the soul out in music and just look at nature and look at a tree limb and you see how wavering and rustic it is and when it’s green it’s not just green. It’s all shades of green, you know, all the subtle pieces are green — that kind of energy we’re trying to get in songs.

NS: Resourcefulness seems to be theme for the Brothers Burn Mountain. You formed while backpacking through the mountains, and now you’re trying to scrape together enough money to buy a used truck and keep traveling. Is this situation unique to the project?

JD: Well, this is something I was just walking around outside thinking about near the lake. Time and again since we began earnestly playing together seriously one and a half years ago, we’ve had to sort through real threadbare times and we have a song on the new album that’s entitled “The Road of Sorrow” and do you mind if I maybe recite some of the lines right now?

NS: Not at all.

JD: Well, it goes like this: “I’m taking the road of Sorrow into the town of bliss. The fiery wind seals my lips with a burning hiss with a burning kiss. And the rain will be a’coming, you can tell by the swallow’s flight. Sometimes things are better wrong than they ever were when they were right — than they ever were when they right. When right is apoplectic, and doesn’t stand a chance. And being wrong and full of love, down the road we dance. Down the road we dance.”